This site is for people who like plants -- growers, enthusiasts, aesthetes, novices and professionals, those who appreciate wild things and those who appreciate the cultivated. I garden in Chelsea, and I've been visiting people's yards for 20+ years in the course of my work. My goal is to make this blog a community project, so if you share my interests, please consider becoming a participant and contributing content -- Guerin. Info: greenstreet@mindspring.com

Saturday, May 5, 2012

A worthy dandelion

Another one that I think I got from Arrowhead Alpines: a garden-worthy dandelion. It doesn't seed around, it spreads by runners at just the rate you would like, it's a cheery yellow. I didn't forget its proper taxonomic identity . . because I never knew it. Some reader will hopefully clue me in. Better yet would be for me to locate my Encyclopedia of Rock Garden Plants, but it's in Ann Arbor and I'm in Chelsea, worlds away on this pleasant Saturday. Update: a reader ID'ed it as a hawkweed: "one of the whitish hairy subspecies of Hieracium pilosella (aka Pilosella officinarum of a
lot of European literature)." He also noted that the plant is well-documented for being highly allelopathic, i.e., toxic to other species. And since he's mentioned it, I recall that the only thing I've ever had to weed out of it was some depauperate Oxalis.

More freeze damage: this is what happened to many yews. Should anyone care about a little bit of freezing at the tip? Not really.